- Winhill Vase Quest
- Dollet Pub/Bone Painting Quest
- Balamb Garden CC Group Quest
- Queen of Cards Quest
- Manipulating the trade rules for disc 4 (Previous chapter)
- Shumi Village Quest
- Stocking up on Ultima at the Shumi Village draw point
- Farming Energy Crystals in Esthar
- Having visited all shops in the game, Esthar most-importantly, to add to your Call Shop ability
- Some enemies, Grat and Creeper, you can no longer encountered outside of the final dungeon
One other thing to note: if you haven't done so already, you need to make a decision on the minor-GF, Odin, back in the Centra Ruins. While you can still acquire him on disc 4, he must be within Lunatic Pandora with you in order to obtain the other minor-GF he is replaced by, Gilgamesh. Opinions vary about which is better, but personally, I loathe Odin, so I will be acquiring Gilgamesh. Odin appears at the beginning of battles, randomly, and dispatches them instantly for you, while Gilgamesh will randomly appear anytime during a battle, including against bosses, and can deal instant death as well as basic damage. The only problem with having Gilgamesh lies below...
Rinoa's Angelo Search ability. While almost-all of the items you can obtain from this you can get elsewhere, there is one you cannot. So, it's highly recommended that you attempt, if you are going to get Gilgamesh, obtaining it before entering Lunatic Pandora. The way Angelo Search works is: at random intervals during battle, Angelo will show and dig up an item that is chosen from a pool of set items. Most players leave a battle on-going during the night or while they are away to try to acquire the item they are looking for. This is easily done by encountering a Turtapod monster, found frequently at the Esthar Sorceress Memorial, waiting for it to hide within its shell, then casting Confuse on it. At that point, no action can be taken by the Turtapod and you are free to Angelo Search as long as you'd like. However, this becomes a problem with Gilgamesh, as he will appear and end the battle prematurely while you are searching; which is why it's recommended you do this on disc 3 or by not getting Gilgamesh at all. Like stated previously though, once you finish Lunatic Pandora, getting Gilgamesh is no longer an option.
Heaven, seen above in the screenshot, is a small island to the north of the Grandini Forest. Both of these islands are littered with hidden, extremely rare, draw points. Including: Ultima, Meteor, Full-life, Tornado, Quake, Triple, Flare, Holy, and Aura and will all recharge. The trade-off is: there are nothing but vicious, level 100, enemies wandering about. These include: Malboro, Grendel, Ruby Dragon, Hexadragon, Tri-Face, Ochu, Chimera, Blue Dragon, and T-Rexaurs. Needless to say, these two islands are the best place in the game to level your characters and Guardian Forces. You can, as usual, use Diablos' Enc-None to just search for the draw points without the battles, if you'd like. When you have everything squared-away that you need to, fly the Ragnarok into Lunatic Pandora.
The party will use the full-force of the Ragnarok to bust through Lunatic Pandora's defenses and create their own entryway inside. Make sure your party is prepared: there is a boss fight just outside.
Doomtrain to start will put a severe damper on the duo's chances of being much of a threat to you with Slow, Darkness, and Vit-0 statuses. If you're prudent, you might want to draw and cast Protect and Shell from Raijin onto the party, but it's not necessary. Watch out for Fujin's new attack, Sai, that can reduce a party member's HP to 1, and for Raijin casting Aura on himself, which you can counter easily with Dispel. Make sure to mug a couple of Megalixirs from Fujin, but don't steal from Raijin! He is carrying a buyable Power Wrist, but will drop a few Str Ups when defeated if you don't steal it. Lastly, if you haven't stocked 100 Full-life spells yet, use this time to draw it from Fujin and stick them on your elemental defense.
There are, however, newer (But already encountered) enemies inside the dungeon, but there's a slight catch: they're all level 1. The reasoning for this is...? You can use these easy battles to gain AP for your GFs, but otherwise, the battles are mostly a waste of time, in my opinion. To reach the next boss, from the entry, head straight and take the elevator to the main hall, then the left-most elevator down to the excavation site. Follow the tunnel around, to a save point, then the northern exit to an encounter with the machine that ejected Zell and Edea from the area earlier on.
Start by summoning Cerberus for the Triple status we will be needing. When all three parts of the boss detach, it is preparing to use the Corona attack, which drops your entire party's HP to 1; but with Triple status, we can easily counter this with Curaga, or, if Quistis is in your party, White Wind, or Selphie's Full-cure from her Slots. Other than Corona, you only need to watch your HP from its constant countering and entire-party-targeting Medigo Flame, but if you keep your HP around 4000 at all times, this shouldn't be a concern. Pilfering is a must for this battle, as well: the main body has a rare Laser Cannon, and the two Pods have Vit and Str Up items (They will not drop, unlike the Laser Cannon). For offense, Cactaur will be your best friend, as his damage cannot be minimized by the Pods ridiculously high Vitality and Spirit, however, you only need to defeat the torso to win the battle.
Note: Seifer and the point-of-no-return is waiting for you in the next room. You can still return to the Ragnarok and the world map if there is anything you still haven't done, but once you confront Seifer, we will be locked out of any and all towns; with a limited selection of other areas we can return to.
If you have Odin, he will appear at the beginning of the battle and Seifer will easily dispatch him. Looks more like Odin just ran straight into his gunblade, but I digress...A mysterious hand will, however, reach out and claim Odin's Zantetsuken.
Seifer STILL can't consistently pull the trigger on his gunblade, which makes him an even bigger joke at this stage of the game. This is your perfect opportunity to stock 100 Aura (Recommend for your Luck stat) spells from him. Once you have, steal a Hero or Holy War (Rarely) and finish him however you like.
Seifer will then snatch Rinoa away and take her to merge with the Sorceress Adel, bringing disc 3 to a close.
Seifer will have fed Rinoa to Adel and she is now, junctioned, I guess, with her. Adel will use Drain on Rinoa periodically during the battle, which is the major factor here, as if she dies, the game is over. To counter this, draw and cast Regen from Rinoa, onto her. Summon Cerberus for Triple status and use Shell and Haste on the party. You will need to rely on single-target magic and physical attacks focused on Adel only; GFs or multi-target limit breaks are out of the question due to effecting Rinoa also. Every couple of turns, throw a Curaga at Rinoa and with Shell cast, your defenses should be fine. Make sure to cast Meltdown on Adel, then steal a Samantha Soul item (Covered next chapter) from her. If you're brave, you can cast Protect on Rinoa and steal 8 Megalixirs from her, but in the next chapter, we will be able to easily obtain a lot of these.
All of these battles are easy; in fact, most of the "Sorceresses" will fall in one, or two, physical attacks. Each one has either a Meteor or Ultima Stone you can steal, if you'd like. With each defeated one, the background will switch to varying locations in the world, reminiscent of the Lavos Core battle from Chrono Trigger.
The party will appear to be back at Edea's House, but upon reaching the backyard, the scene will quickly change to that of an apocalyptic future with Ultimecia's Castle looming in the sky.
Cross the gigantic chains, passing by three glowing portals, for the moment, to arrive at Ultimecia Castle.
